As housewives, the Germans are doubtless unsurpassed by any other nation; the houses are clean, the stoves shine brightly, and they are for ever washing clothes in the river. We cannot applaud the way in which they cook their meat generally, but their puddings are admirable. At Cochem our landlady used to send us up souffléd puddings that would have done credit to the Palais Royal. On the Moselle the old-fashioned spinning-wheel is to be seen in every village, and knitting is always taken in hand when walking or superintending household affairs.
Singing is constantly heard in the evening, and many of the little coteries in the townlets by our river’s side subscribe to hire a piano from Coblence or Trèves, and by the aid of its music they make lively the long hours of darkness in winter.
The priests seem respected, and on amicable terms with all classes, but generally they do not hold the same social position that they do in this country.
If the traveller on the Moselle is himself not over-exacting, and ready to meet civility half-way, he will find all those he encounters polite and pleasant, and he cannot fail of spending an agreeable time on the banks of our charming river.
The Roman poet Ausonius, who about the year A.D. 370, when passing through the dense forests that covered all Germany, suddenly came out on the Moselle near Neumagen, was so struck with the beauty of the river that he explored its course, and then wrote a poem thereon. The palaces and the buildings he mentions have all passed away, but the natural beauties remain; and the old castles that at the present time adorn the tops of the hills quite make up for the towers that are gone.
Now, as then, the vine grows luxuriantly over the cliffs, the peaceful river flows calmly on; and the people dwelling on its banks are simple, loyal, and brave.
We have now reached and described Coblence, and with Coblence ends the Life of the Moselle. We have sat with her beneath the forest shade that shelters her birthplace in the Vosges mountains; we have day after day wandered by her side as she bounded along in all the freshness of her youth, or as, in later days, she floated on majestic in her beauty; we have slept night after night, lulled by the ripple of her waters; we have climbed among her mountains and her forests; we have mused or sung amidst her ruins; we have dreamt of other days, of olden times, of things that come not again save in such dreams; we have also, it is to be hoped, in some measure, profited by our communion with the great heart of Nature,—something, we trust, we have learnt of that inner life which makes the very stones and earth preach to us of their Divine origin.
By the Moselle we have found flowers growing, beautiful in their forms and colours, but more beautiful in their uncultured wildness; we have listened to the songs of the gay birds as we rested in the woods; the clouds have fleeted through the pure blue vault, rain has freshened earth and sun has ripened her fruits: all these, and many other incidents, have striven to teach us to love and reverence the great heart of Nature; that heart which, if the Painter, with all his skill of colour or of handiwork, fail to express, he sinks back into the mere copyist; if the Poet feel it not or love it not, his bark is stranded on a barren shore; and what would music be without it?
If, then, the Moselle has whispered or suggested to us aught of this heart, this inner life of Nature, let us preserve it within us pure and beautiful, as all things in Nature are; so shall our summer’s tour have not been made in vain, nor useless been the life of the Moselle.
Standing at that spot where the Moselle and Rhine are met, we now take leave of our dear river.